It's Just a Game
by Bloodshot Eyes
Summary: It's 2016 & Light is bored to death. Ryuk offers him the Death Note, a program that lets him wreak havoc anonymously in a virtual world. L pursues this Kira, but when real people start dying, the line between fantasy and reality blurs beyond recognition.
1. The Death Note

A/N - This story came from the Plot Bunny Exchange as well, and the idea for this one came from TimeTravelFreak. See my profile for more details.

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The Death Note

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April, 2016

"Hooray, starting a new stage in life, becoming an adult, blah blah blah." Light Yagami mimicked the principal's closing speech to his graduating class on the way home. His mother and sister had left shortly thereafter to go shopping, and his father had missed it due to work. His graduation from high school, placing first in all of Japan this year, and he missed it.

It wasn't as though he wasn't used to disappointment, though. He had caught the train and was walking the last few blocks home in blissful solitude. The streets were empty since most people were finishing school or still at work, and he reveled in the quiet.

He didn't hate his family, really, but they got on his nerves lately with their inane questions about school, something he didn't care about even if he was good at it. He was only doing it to keep from getting bored, but his classmates didn't offer much by way of competition. If they had pulled their heads out of the sand long enough to see that there was a bigger world outside their petty concerns, they might have been more difficult to beat.

He unlocked the door to the house and toed off his shoes, saying "I'm home" to an empty house and heading up the stairs. Normally his mother was there waiting for him after his test results came in, an eager smile on her face and in her eyes as she reached out for the papers before he even got them out of his bag. She probably thought she had to be enthusiastic enough for both parents since his father was rarely home in time for dinner, much less in time to spend any quality time with the family. Sayu, his sister, was often out with friends doing who-knows-what downtown until long after dinner and was forever being reprimanded by their parents. Then she would pull the repentant act while she begged Light to help her with her homework in order to get it done before school the next day.

With a family like that and nothing to offer him a reprieve from boredom and irritation with the direction the world was headed in, no wonder he wasn't excited about graduating. Now he just had too much time to waste before his college classes started.

What did people do when they were so disappointed by reality that they longed to start school, of all things? School wasn't fun, it was just more drudgery.

If only something would fall out of the sky, something more interesting than this boring life. He was tired of it. Taking off his dress clothes, he put on a more comfortable pair of jeans and just collapsed on his bed, wondering if he could take a nap and magically wake up in a more positive mental state. Not likely, but it was worth a shot.

Several hours later, Light woke, still in the same frame of mind, so he rolled out of bed and pulled on a shirt before leaving his room. He flicked on the television and set about making dinner. His mother and sister were still out; he had a text message waiting from Sayu saying as much. His father wouldn't be home until much later either, so he threw some vegetables and chicken into the wok, intending to put it on the rice still sitting in the rice cooker from this morning.

He stood, poking blindly at his food while it cooked, his eyes on the news. Even if his life was dull, the news seldom was, for they wouldn't report on anything not worth listening to since they had ratings to worry about. His ears were faintly aware of the usual string of murders, political scandals, entertainment news, and environmental crises, but when an update came on about a video game, of all things, his ears perked up at the strangeness.

The reporter looked positively delighted as he extolled the virtues of this new virtual reality game by Wammy House that might finally hit shelves by late autumn that year. It was revolutionary, the first of its kind, and according to him, everyone was buzzing with excitement about it.

Light smirked. If he was part of this 'everyone' and he didn't even know it existed, this idiot had no right to say that everyone was excited. Advertising was a tissue of lies if people could run around spouting trite crap like that and expect everyone to believe it.

He turned off the heat and scooped the food out of the wok, served his rice, and sat down in front of the TV. It looked like they were doing a special on this game, for it was still running. What was this world coming to when a stupid video game made it on national news and occupied more than a 30-second time slot in the technology report? He didn't care quite enough to turn it off while he ate, for he knew that the other 100 channels only had mindless entertainment news, game shows, or… reality television. He shuddered just thinking about it.

They were interviewing several executives from the company about the game, and all they could talk about was how they were sinking millions into design and had some of the most advanced artificial intelligence the world had ever seen. It was a MMORPG, which Light only knew meant massive multiplayer online roleplaying game because that World of Warcraft game and its knockoffs had been circling the corpse of Japanese youth like a vulture for years now, sucking the life out of students and adults alike with its addictive properties. It was nothing he had ever been interested in, for he could see the reddened eyes and dark circles under the eyes of the students who couldn't stop playing long enough to study or sleep before coming into school the next day.

The fact that they didn't even explain that term was a testament to how pervasive its effects were. Light sighed and picked at the remains of his food, adding MMORPGs to society's growing list of sins against intelligence and common sense, which was headed by the aforementioned reality television.

His eyes started going out of focus while they were explaining about the game's properties and the beta testing going on all over the world. He sat for long moments, his brain refusing to acknowledge that this was it, this was the end of the world when games made it on the news instead of things that actually mattered.

The irony of that was that none of it mattered, at least to him.

* * *

The next day, Light rose later than he was accustomed to only because he didn't have school to worry about waking up for. His mother was awake and happily made him breakfast to make up for not being home for dinner, but his sister was asleep since her classes were over, and his father was at work already. Light had been thinking for years about becoming a detective like him, but him being gone so much was making him rethink that decision. Then again, he didn't really have anyone to be home _for_, so maybe it wouldn't bother him as much to have long work days.

He took the train downtown because he had nothing better to do and didn't want to stay home. Soichiro's job might be demanding, but at least it paid quite well so Light never had a shortage of spending money even if he didn't throw it away on a regular basis like his sister. The bookstore was his first stop, followed by a slow meandering path through some of the other districts as he glanced in store windows and debated if he needed any new clothes or something for his computer.

His favorite electronics store lay just ahead, but today there were balloons outside the store and a small crowd of people waiting to go inside, so there must be a sale going on. Light debated whether or not he wanted to go in when there were so many people, so he tried to find out if they were waiting for anything in particular.

"Is the line just to get inside?" he asked a man probably in his 30's when he got close to the end of the line.

"No, we're waiting to sign up for that game, the one that's been on the news so much." The man looked excited, almost breathless with the prospect.

"The VR one by Wammy House?" Light couldn't believe he knew enough to even ask that question.

"That's the one. The game's not on sale yet, but they're taking applications for beta testers here."

"Oh, is that so." Light barely kept from sighing in the man's face, which would have been rude. Instead, he bypassed the line and sidled in the door just to look at the merchandise. He tried to ignore all the chatter behind him as he looked at external hard drives for his computer. The sheer number of people in here was putting a damper on his mood, though, so he skimmed the shelves distractedly before contemplating just leaving.

"You're not signing up?" a slightly raspy voice behind him asked as he put back one of the products.

"No, I'm not. I'm not… interested…" Light turned, irritated, to meet the speaker before his voice trailed off. The man standing behind him was over 6 feet tall and almost as pale as milk. His pallor was only accentuated by the black eyeliner, lipstick, and the spiky ebony hair. Even his clothes were all black, a tight leather top with slashes in the sleeves and what looked like pants made out of belts or strips of leather atop clunky boots. It was a runaway from the Harajuku District if he ever saw one.

"You don't play video games?" The man smiled in a vaguely predatory manner and chuckled darkly, crossing one arm over his chest and fiddling with his heart-shaped earring with the other ghostly pale hand tipped in black fingernails. Light didn't like the way he was looking him over, like he was a piece of meat.

"No, I don't have time for that nonsense." He turned back to the display before him and tried to display a studious disinterest in the man.

"Don't give me the cold shoulder. I understand you completely," that creepy chuckle came again as the man leaned against the display beside him. Light glanced up and was about to tell him exactly where he could stick it when the man spoke again. "You look bored, and I have a proposition for you since you think all this is stupid." The freak of nature glanced over at the table where people were signing up for beta testing before looking back at Light, as though he didn't want to be seen. Light couldn't stop staring at the man's face despite his best efforts to look away, for he just looked so strange and out of place.

"If you truly think this is idiotic, call me. I have something you might like." He pulled a card out of nowhere, the slip of white and black paper appearing between his claw-like fingers.

"I'm not looking for a fix or whatever you're offering, now get lost." Light had never met a drug dealer with this kind of nerve, approaching someone in broad daylight in a store. For that matter, he had never even met a drug dealer before, since they didn't exactly hang around cram schools or his quiet suburban neighborhood.

"I'm not selling drugs!" that ghastly chuckle manifested again as the man laughed in genuine amusement. "I work for those idiots." He tilted his head toward the Wammy House's table.

"So what are you trying to sell me?" Light reluctantly turned from the display since this conversation was just too odd to ignore. "I already told you I'm not interested in that game."

"Absolutely nothing. I want to give you the game, in a sense. I need someone who thinks it's as boring and idiotic as it sounds."

"Well, you've got that part right. Why would I want it, though?"

"Come with me," the man gestured, heading for the front of the store. "C'mon, man, it's broad daylight. I'm not going to rob you." It wasn't getting robbed that Light was worried about, though, what with the leers the man was directing at him. Sighing, he left the store, wondering exactly what he was getting into by following a stranger around. He was just bored enough to contemplate taking this man up on his offer, whatever it was, for it was certainly outside the realm of his usual humdrum existence.

"Look," the man continued when he and Light were slightly up the street from the line of people. "I'm supposed to be finding testers for this game, but I'm on break right now. I saw that disgust on your face and figured I found what I was looking for. You ever played an online game before?"

"No," he answered shortly as the man started rolling his business card over the tops of his fingers, back and forth like it was a coin trick. "I don't do games at all."

"Perfect. I'm looking for someone inexperienced because the gamers get to be all the same after a while. All they want to do is level and kill things and buy stuff." Light eyeballed him while he rubbed the back of his neck.

"Would you be getting to the point of this anytime soon?"

"Hehe, I needed someone arrogant too, and it looks like I found him. Look, don't leave." Light started to turn away, but turned back to humor him, though he couldn't fathom why. "I can see you're bored, and I'm offering a way out of that with this."

He brandished a mini-disk from his back pocket, unmarked in a clear case. He held it out to Light, and he took it, glancing at it with amusement.

"A disk? What is this, the Dark Ages?" He hadn't seen a disk since he was a child since everything was downloadable or streaming media these days.

"The game runs on disks, believe it or not. You install it into a headset of sorts that you wear while you're playing. This isn't available for sale, what I'm giving you."

"So what is it? And who are you, anyway?" The man smiled, and that expression made a chill run through Light.

"You can call me Ryuk, and this is the Death Note."

-

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A/N - Next chapter should be up before too much longer, no worries about the brevity of this one. Believe it or not, having more stories to write does not affect my update speed for my other ones. I need to let the Muses recharge for a few days while I hash out the next chapter, and having more stories just gives me more to work on while they recharge. Wow, I said "more" a lot.

I've changed my writing style to suit the story so it reads more like young adult fiction, just to see if I can do it. I'm basing it off K.A. Applegate's "Everworld" series and Meg Cabot's "Princess Diaries", minus the first person perspective, of course. Let me know if it works, please?


	2. Birth of a Shinigami

Birth of a Shinigami

* * *

"Sounds sinister," Light remarked, sounding unimpressed. "Interesting name, Ryuk-san."

"It's a screen name, actually. Who cares what my real name is? Leave off the _–san_, though. I'm not Japanese and it bothers me."

"Might I point out that you're in Japan? 'When in Rome…'" Ryuk waved him off flippantly, jingling a collection of chains he was wearing around his wrists.

"Fine, whatever."

"So what is the Death Note?"

"Thought you'd never ask. It's a program I've developed that lets you create a character for the game without registering, so you don't have to give the company your name or your credit card information."

"So I can play for free. Again, why would I want to do that?"

"So you can mess things up, actually. I've put years into this game and I'm sick to death of what it's becoming. They just kicked me off the development team because I had some ideas they didn't like, which is why I'm out here killing time with the beta testing team."

"Let me get this straight," Light almost laughed at the sheer absurdity of this conversation. "You're letting me join the game anonymously so I can ruin it?" Ryuk nodded, his earring swinging back and forth as he did so.

"Well, not so much ruin it as shake things up," he corrected. "I don't want to be out of a job just yet."

"Why do you want to do all this?"

"Because I'm bored, and so are you, which I imagine is why you're even contemplating this." Ryuk backed off a little and held out his hands. "Look, man, you've got nothing to lose. No money, no respect since no one knows who you are. I'm just offering an alternative to being bored."

"What's in it for you?" Nothing in this world was free, and Light was curious what the other man hoped to get out of this.

"All I ask is that you let me tag around when you join. I want to see what you do, and I'll give you pointers along the way."

"That doesn't sound that horrible." What was he getting himself into? It sounded like there were no strings attached, though, and that was almost too good to be true. The man hadn't even asked his name, so he had no interest in stalking or keeping an eye on him.

"Think about it." Ryuk took the disc back as Light was staring at it and replaced it with his card. It was a heavily embossed card with the man's name and his technical credentials as well as the title 'Developer' for Wammy House. His phone and email were listed as well, but no name other than the screen name 'Ryuk'. "You lose nothing if you join, I'll make sure of that. It's just an escape from boredom, like any game should be. Call me, and I'll get you a headset and get you started. Don't wait too long, though, or I might have to look for someone else."

"Okay." He didn't have anything more to say than that. "Thanks, I guess."

"No problem, man. My break's over by now." He turned and raised a hand in salutation, heading back to the store. "Catch ya later." He jangled as he walked away with all the chains at his waist clanging together, a discordant symphony all by himself.

"Later," Light waved back, putting the card in his back pocket. Again, he wondered what in the world he was contemplating. It might actually be worth it, though, if it kept him from being so bored this summer. After all, he had nothing else to do until college started up again in the late summer, and it wasn't as though he needed a part-time job.

Maybe it was worth doing, after all. He'd think more later about contacting Ryuk.

* * *

As it turned out, he didn't wait very long. After he got home that day, he tried watching the television, but there was only more idiocy about the game as well as news he really didn't care about that much. His mother was no help, since she only worked in the house when she wasn't shopping or watching her dramas. His sister was gone again, and his father was never there to be any cure to his crushing boredom.

Without school to study for, he really didn't have anything to do. He paged through the books he bought that day and skimmed various websites, but when night fell, he thought he would tear his hair out with sheer frustration. He had never been so bored in his life, almost as though having Ryuk tell him that made him notice it that much more.

He had never been interested in making friends in school since by and large his classmates were shallow and uninteresting people, which was why he had no one to turn to for conversation when he wasn't in school. The lack of any sort of stimulus was draining.

That was why he called Ryuk only two days later, seriously interested in anything that would break his depressing cycle of waking, reading, eating, and sleeping. He couldn't fathom spending weeks doing this without going crazy, so he turned to the only person that had been even remotely different and therefore fascinating by default.

"Wammy House, this is Ryuk speaking. How can I help you?" He sounded completely different with that almost formal tone of voice. Without giving his name, he tried to think of something only he would know to show his identity.

"Hey, Ryuk. You showed me the Death Note at—"

"—the electronics place. I forgot the name already, but I remember your voice. What's up?" Now he sounded more like he had that day. "You think about my offer?"

"Yes, I did, and I'm willing to take you up on it."

"Great. I'm working today, so I don't have a headset on me. Want to meet tomorrow after noon? I'll bring all you need." This man wasted no time getting to the point now, Light noticed.

"Sure. Anywhere in particular?"

"I'm looking across the street at something called 'The Dancing Goat'. You know where that coffeeshop is?"

"I'll find it." With a name like that, it was probably an independent and would be one-of-a-kind, therefore easier to find.

"One o'clock, be there… or be bored. Just kidding. I'll see you then." He hung up before Light could say anything in response. Ryuk talked strangely and acted socially retarded, which wasn't surprising given what he imagined being a software developer was like. The man probably seldom saw the light of day with a job like that.

At least tomorrow he would have something new to amuse himself with. Things had to start looking up after this.

* * *

"This is it?" Light turned the device over in his hands, examining the completely opaque visor and the noise-isolating earphones that dangled from it. It looked too simple. He and Ryuk were sitting inside The Dancing Goat and taking sips of ridiculously strong espresso. He was almost jittery with the caffeine.

"No, it plugs into this," Ryuk held up a box with a standard plug for a wall outlet. "We tried to make it all one unit, but we don't have that kind of processing power, and it made the headset too bulky." He was taking the pieces one by one out of a canvas satchel that he had said he would give to Light to carry everything in.

"You're supposed to lie down while wearing it, since you'll be unconscious, essentially. It's like going to sleep to start using it, or waking up when you log off. It sort of taps into your sensory receptors, so it puts you to sleep to keep you from getting 'overstimulated'."

"What if someone needs to wake me up for something?" This sounded so strange, but if people were already using it to test it out, it shouldn't be dangerous, right?

"Trust me, if they hit you, you'll wake up. You can set an alarm to log you off after a certain amount of time too, so you're not on all night without realizing it."

"Okay. Anything else I need to know right away?"

"Believe it or not, no. The Death Note will get you started and explain things when you first log in, and then it will ping me so I can find you in-game and explain everything else. Just pop the disk in before you put on the headset, since I already installed the basic game software into it."

"So it doesn't know who I am? No one can find out?" Ryuk chuckled and put everything back in the bag.

"Nope. Technology isn't advanced enough to read minds. All we're doing with this is tapping into your senses so you feel like you're in the game. We can't read your thoughts, just feed you information." Ryuk leaned forward slightly on the table. "I don't work in the biotech department or anything, so I can't tell you exactly what it's doing, but it won't harm you. It's just another way to amuse yourself."

"If you say so." Could he really trust some random stranger? If nothing else, he could probably contact the company if he had problems, since he knew exactly who Ryuk worked for and they weren't exactly a small company. He had done his research, and Wammy House was a multi-million-dollar operation, if they hadn't gone into the billions yet.

"Hey, I've been 'logged in' for years, and it hasn't changed me!" Light raised an eyebrow at the man's laugh, his manner of dress, his eccentric behavior.

"Really, now."

"I've always been this strange. You should see the rest of the team." Another rasping laugh as he finished off his coffee. "Well, you enjoy this. Try to come up with a screen name or something that I can call you when you log in. I don't like calling you nothing, and I don't want your real name or anything."

"I'll think of something. Thanks again, Ryuk."

"No problem. I'm off for the next two days, so I should be on if you log in. Have fun!" He stood to his gargantuan height and headed off, his outfit today not much different than it had been before. Light watched him go before looking into the satchel again. He felt a smile pulling itself across his features as he hoped that herein lay his salvation, the solution to his ever-present boredom.

* * *

Ryuk almost skipped as he went through the halls of the hotel that Wammy House, Incorporated, had put them up in while they were in Japan. The corporation's headquarters were in Winchester, England, but that wasn't that well-known. It wasn't necessary with a company that took care of most of its business online.

Things should get more interesting soon, if he'd picked out the right person for the job, per se. He knocked on one of the doors and waited, knowing that the paranoid occupant would want to see who he was before he was allowed inside. Finally the door clicked open and his dark-haired friend was barely visible heading back to his seat through the small opening.

"Hey, man, how's the testing going?" The young man who was every bit as pale as he was turned black, shadowed eyes toward him, the eyes nearly hidden beneath that shaggy hair. He was crouched on the floor in front of a computer with three screens, which looked like it had vomited cables all over the carpet. There was a headset lying on the floor near him, but he was using the two keyboards in front of him instead.

"We almost have enough subjects. Hopefully we'll be able to start next week once we narrow it down to 20 people for this site, a fitting sample representing each demographic that we are aiming at."

"You as tired of it all as I am?" Ryuk stretched, stifling a yawn as he changed subjects.

"I don't know what you mean," the boy said mechanically. "I love my job. I love working for Mr. Wammy. I love what I do."

"Like hell you do," Ryuk pulled a pack of cloves out of his back pocket and lit one up, savoring the sweet and spicy aroma. "Just because you're his son doesn't mean you have to do this."

"I don't have a choice. Put that shit out, this isn't a smoking room." Ryuk raised his eyebrows at the unusual display of temper but knocked the cherry off with the underside of his boot. He didn't want to waste the cigarette, so he stuck the stub back in his pocket, grinding the measly ashes into the carpet under his toe.

"What's got you so angry? The old man say something to you again?" The younger man let out a short, barking laugh.

"Ryuk, you know it's what he doesn't say that bothers me. Did you come here for anything in particular, or are you just wasting my time too?"

"I'm just letting you know that things might get more interesting." Ryuk grinned, and a faint smile lit up the boy's face as well. "I can't tell you all the details, but I'm hoping a little project of mine pans out."

"Well, you'll have to keep me informed." Those dead black eyes went back to the monitors. "This testing certainly isn't worth wasting my genius on, after all. Let me know if you want anything else, okay? I'm already working on a new glitch to put into your Death Note, and I'm calling it The Eyes."

"Sounds cool. What's it do?" Now the boy grinned genuinely, turning to look at him and looking slightly like a Goth pixie with that childish smile in a ghost-white face.

"Not telling. You'll have to wait until it's done."

"Sure thing. I'm off again, but take it easy, ok? Don't let the old man get you down."

"Yeah, whatever." At the mention of his father, the boy's amusement dwindled until he looked as lifeless as he had when Ryuk first entered the room. He opened the door and left him staring at the monitors without even acknowledging his departure.

Ryuk should have felt more guilty using Mr. Wammy's own son just to kill his boredom, but the kid had more than enough reasons to work against his unconcerned foster father. If Ryuk actually cared about anyone, he might not have approached that random auburn-haired Japanese boy either, but they were all just pawns to him. He liked moving them around and playing them off each other to see what happened.

Life was just a game, after all.

* * *

L rifled through the dessert tray that had just shown up at his room, trying to decide what he wanted for dinner. Like everyone else at Wammy House, he was busy tweaking things in the game and trying to iron out wrinkles before it went live, hopefully in only a few months.

Surprisingly, Wammy hadn't even announced the name of this virtual reality nightmare yet, and the advertising department was going crazy. If he knew his foster father, the man just hadn't decided on one of the many that had been offered.

Sighing, he decided that since there was no strawberry cheesecake available, a chocolate one would have to do. He picked it off and sent the rest of the tray away with the maid who had brought it.

Turning back to the computer, he glanced over the growing list of things to add to the Frequently Asked Questions file, which he had taken on with some irritation. It was something suited to someone far less intelligent than he was, but Wammy House was growing short-handed now that they were establishing field sites all over the world to start testing the game. He had accepted the new task, and the accompanying pay raise, with his usual level of decorum, which is to say, none at all.

At least it was keeping him busy, though. His part in the game wasn't even available until it went live, since he was the head of the "law enforcement" for the game, the 'Watchers'. It should be fun, at least for a while. Well, it should keep the boredom away for a few years. He slumped a little more in front of his computer, wondering when keeping away boredom had become the defining characteristic of his life.

* * *

Light could barely contain his excitement, which was incredibly rare for him. He was never more than pleased with anything, so to have something that made him even slightly giddy was out of the ordinary. He headed home with the satchel, slipping into the house and up the stairs before his mother could try to tell him about her day.

Dumping out all of the contents on his bed, he assembled it all in the order that Ryuk had shown him, plugging it into his Internet relay and the wall outlet before putting in the Death Note disk. A little light blinked on the box as it loaded, but he ignored it and lay down on his bed, trying to get comfortable before holding the visor up to his face. He had noticed the glittering nodes positioned about where his temples would be inside the visor while he was in the coffee shop with Ryuk, and he assumed that this was how the information would get into his head. Before he could get nervous about allowing something access to his mind, he slipped it on.

It blocked out all the light, which he figured was the point of it since his eyes would be closed during the game. He could feel the nodes pressing into his temples, but it wasn't painful or even uncomfortable. He slipped the earplugs into his ears, and a silent darkness blanketed him while he waited for the Death Note to prompt him to do something.

It seemed like long moments before a quiet voice counted backwards from 10 in English, and he felt like he was falling asleep.

He never heard the countdown reach zero before he opened his eyes in a dark room illuminated by a bluish light. There was a map floating in space before him, and he walked up to the source of the light. All of the words were in English. Fortunately he knew English fairly well, though Ryuk hadn't told him that the game would be entirely in that language. He wasn't a slow reader, but he could listen to it much faster than he could read it.

A disembodied woman's voice, also speaking English, made him jump.

"Welcome to the login screen of The World." He tried to quiet his racing heartbeat, then grew amazed that he could even feel it. If this was the game, then it felt like the real thing already. "You can modify your appearance with the controls to your right. Choose carefully, for you will only be allowed to choose once before the changes are made permanent to your avatar." A new window opened up to his side, and the map before him turned into a mirror. His own face stared back, but it looked slightly different, like his skin had been smoothed and his hair made less complicated, as though he was looking at a very good drawing of himself.

He glanced over the controls. He could change his eye, skin, and hair color, and there was actually an option to change his age. The controls looked like nothing but glowing lines of light, but he moved them up and down or selected different options just to see what they all did. Sliding the 'age' button put a few wrinkles on his face and grayed the hair at his temples a little, but it wasn't very convincing. He slid it the opposite way and saw his eyes grow larger and his face rounder, so he looked slightly more child-like. The game developers must have wanted people to mostly stick to their natural appearance. He put the slider back to its default position and made his hair dark red and his eyes crimson to match. The person in the mirror looked much more sinister now, especially when he made his face a little paler. He would have to ask Ryuk if he could make himself look unrecognizable later.

He touched the word 'Done' at the end and the map reappeared. It was mostly green forest with a few rivers winding through it and a lake or two. There were towns dotted all over, and straight black lines connected each town in a loose web. There were brown lines as well connecting the towns, but these were more winding and less direct. There were other symbols on the map, but he didn't know what they were for.

"Choose a starting point for your character. This will become your character's hometown. You will only be able to choose a place once, for this map is only available upon initial login. Each time you log in thereafter, you will appear in the town you last left. Since this is a beta testing stage, only three towns are available and there are no details to look up."

Without any information to read, all the towns looked the same to Light, so he touched a random one. The map winked out of existence and the room was plunged into darkness.

When he opened his eyes again, wondering when he had closed them, he was standing inside a large room. Sunlight spilled through the windows set high in the walls, but there was nothing to illuminate since the room looked bare. He took a step before the same feminine voice frightened him by appearing from nowhere.

"This is the hotel in Ravenloft, which is where you chose to have your character spawn. Each time you log back in, you will appear in a hotel like this one. Please leave the hotel and explore the town outside."

He tried to suppress a chuckle at the feigned politeness as he walked out the door. It was midday outside, and there was a cobblestone street before him winding between two-story homes that crowded the road. He could feel his feet hit the rocks beneath them, and he could hear voices from a distance. It was incredibly realistic, even if he could stare at the sun in this world without hurting his eyes.

"Hey!" A rasping voice came out of the air next to his ear, and when he turned to the side, he screamed like a girl and jumped. There was a monster there, and he tried not to run away like a coward when he knew this was all fake, all just a game. Breathing hard as his heart raced, he was surprised to see the monster start laughing. It was around eight feet tall with black, bony wings without any webbing and a body so emaciated that it looked like it was all bones beneath the black leather or vinyl that covered it. Its face was almost clown-like with that hideously large mouth full of sharp teeth and the black surrounding its eyes. When he caught sight of the dangling heart earring, though, he started to breath easier.

"R-ryuk?" he stammered, trying to stop hyperventilating, and the monster nodded.

"It's me, kid. This is how I'll look in-game, just for kicks. You got a name yet?"

"No, I didn't pick one."

"Wait a sec, I forgot to tell you," Ryuk waved an elongated hand as though to shush him. "I'm invisible to everyone else, so you will have to talk quietly since no one else can see me."

"Okay," Light muttered. "So you're just going to watch over my shoulder?"

"Yep. And tell you stuff, of course. I don't have a playable character in the game anymore, since I got taken out of my department, but when you use the Death Note, I can participate. Let's get started. Oh, shit."

"Welcome!" a falsely perky voice in English came from behind Light, making him jump again. He turned to see a man standing there in a black suit with wire-rimmed glasses and dark hair. He was smiling, but it looked completely forced. There were words in blue floating over his head that read "Mikami - Mod".

"Did you just get here? Has anyone explained the FAQ to you?" He kept grinning, which made him look vaguely disturbed.

"That's Teru Mikami. He's part of the legal department, but he must be doing this for the extra money," Ryuk muttered to his side. "Don't look at me, he can't see me." Light obediently looked back, trying to remember to ignore the floating apparition next to him.

"What's an FAQ?" he asked, and Mikami sighed.

"Why do I get all the newbies?" he said to himself in Japanese, his smile vanishing as he pulled a clipboard out from under his arm. He looked like he was trying to smile and be cheerful again, but it wasn't working very well as he resumed in English. "I'm Mikami, a Moderator, as you can tell from the words over my head. These will tell you where a Moderator is in-game so you can ask questions. This introduction only happens in the beta testing stage, since what I'm doing right now is fleshing out the FAQ so it will be readable for everyone else when the game is available to buy." His English was very slightly accented, but Light decided not to tell him that he could speak Japanese too. It was one more way to hide his identity.

"Follow me and I'll give you a brief tour. If you have any questions at all, please ask, for I need to know them so we can add them to the file." Mikami started off, and Light obediently followed, Ryuk floating in the air next to him as he walked.

"Which site are you at?" the man asked distractedly, looking down at his clipboard. Light glanced at Ryuk, for he had no idea what the man was asking.

"Tell him you're in Los Angeles. He wants to know where you applied to be a tester, since there are places all over the world. Don't worry, he has no way of confirming the information."

"Los Angeles," Light replied, and Mikami wrote something down while Ryuk continued.

"At the sites, the beta testers are playing in a room where they can be supervised by people like me. We're watching their vital signs and such so we know they're okay, and we log them off after a few hours and take the equipment back since we don't want it getting out. They've signed a waiver saying that they won't discuss the game either, but that won't last for long." Mikami started talking again, so Ryuk fell quiet.

"The game takes place in sixteenth century England, as you can see from the architecture and the clothes you're wearing." Light looked down, not even having thought to look. He was in a plain brown leather jerkin, loose pants made of cloth, and an off-white linen shirt. He had equally plain boots on his feet and a small dagger and a pouch hanging from a belt around his waist.

"You can upgrade and buy new clothes and armor and weapons or anything really with in-game currency, which is copper, silver, and gold. To get it, you can roleplay that you are a citizen of this town and receive a small wage at the end of the day. This is for those who are more interested in living out a new virtual lifestyle here. In addition, you can check the bulletin board in town," he waved at a wooden plaque covered in notices nailed to a tree. "On these you can find quests or bounties on creatures that live outside town that you can fulfill to earn money or items. There are a large variety of quests that will change regularly. You can also take quests from shopowners, bartenders, and other NPC's as well."

"What's an NPC?" This was a lot of information that he was completely unfamiliar with, having never played a game in his life. Mikami looked testy as he answered, but he did a better job of covering it up this time.

"A Non-Playable Character. It's an AI, Artificial Intelligence. They are characters that have no names floating over their heads. You don't have one either right now, but that's because you have a beta account and the testers haven't actually registered. When the game goes live, everyone will have their screen name floating over their heads since everyone will have had to give their registration information and credit card numbers in order to log in. There's a monthly fee to play the game." Light glanced over at Ryuk, wondering if that would be the case with him.

"Don't worry, kid. You won't have anything to identify you and you won't ever have to pay, trust me." He raised his eyebrows in disbelief since he couldn't say anything, and Ryuk chuckled.

"As I was saying, you can take quests, or you can buy in-game currency with actual money. The best items can only be gotten by questing, but that's not for everyone. There are very few people in the towns right now, but they will be much more populated later. You can also adventure outside the town and kill monsters, take quests from NPC's outside town, or just explore the dungeons for treasure and monsters." This all sounded so inane. Did people really waste their time doing this? He glanced around and saw no one; it was almost like a ghost town right now. Mikami kept rambling as he walked.

"You can use the money to buy things in town. Ah, I almost forgot. You have to leave the town in order to actually kill anything. In town, you can only explore, buy goods, which includes food and drink, visit the hospital to cure wounds, talk with other characters, meet up with people, you get my point. It is supposed to simulate real life, just without the obvious political and environmental crises. The focus is on human interaction and meeting people."

"Is that _all_ I can do?" he asked, imitating Mikami's high-handed tone of voice. This sounded so dull.

"It does sound boring, doesn't it?" Ryuk murmured, sounding disgusted with the game he had helped design.

Mikami hissed something under his breath in Japanese again, and it sounded like "Is every teen a hormonal pervert?" Then he straightened and put that forced smile back on. "If you're asking if you can copulate with other characters, the answer is no. You'll find you're as anatomically correct as a Ken doll. The game is not all about sex, sorry to disappoint. If you want to get drunk, though, we have simulated that fairly well, so go do that if you're upset." He'd pissed the man off, and it made him smile. Ryuk was guffawing off to his side, and Light was trying hard not to laugh along with him. From Mikami's rapid fire answer, he could only guess that the question had been asked many times before.

"If you're done, I'll keep going. You have to leave the town in order to actually perform any violent act, and there is no player killing in the game whatsoever." Before Light could even ask about that, Mikami continued, holding out his clipboard and his other arm as though making himself look defenseless. "What I mean is, you can't kill other players at any time in order to take their possessions. It looks fairly funny to attack another character, since you just kind of keep missing. Try it."

Light stared at the man while Ryuk started laughing. He pulled out the little dagger on his belt and looked at it. "Are you serious?"

"Like a heart attack. Take a swing. You won't hurt me. I'm just trying to prove a point." Mikami still stood there, his smug face looking into Light's. He still hesitated, since it just felt so wrong to randomly attack someone who wouldn't even fight back. "Do it, c'mon, I dare you."

"Oh, this should be good," Ryuk said lowly.

Okay, that was childish. Light scowled and took a step forward, bringing the knife back to get some extra swing room. He didn't have any experience wielding a dagger and really had no idea how to attack with one. It didn't even matter, since it was going to bounce off or something, but he didn't want to look like a complete idiot. To Mikami's credit, the man didn't even flinch when Light aimed the dagger at his throat and swung with all his might.

He did look damned surprised when the dagger went right through his neck, the blade catching midway through as Light hit his spine with the tip of the blade, but it kept sliding until there was a gaping hole all the way across the man's throat. Mikami's eyes were huge, and blood splattered across Light's chest and face as he stood, frozen. The black-haired man gurgled, blood running out of his mouth as he took a step, then fell to the side, hitting the ground like a sack of flour, lifeless.

"Holy—" Light couldn't even finish that, shocked into stupidity. "But he said…" he stammered, dumbfounded because Mikami had looked as surprised as he at that turn of events. "He said I couldn't kill him." Mikami's now dead character flickered out of existence, his clipboard vanishing with him.

"You might want to log off now," Ryuk laughed to his side. "Just think about waking up." Light nodded shakily, still feeling the blood on his face as he willed himself to wake up.

He reappeared in the dark room from before with the map before him, and the blood was all gone. Ryuk was there too, and Light turned on him.

"What just happened?" He hated the quavering note in his voice, but he had just slit a man's throat! There was no way he could be calm after that. Was that illegal? No, it was just a game. People killed each other in games all the time. They didn't know who he was, couldn't trace him…

"Calm down, kid." Ryuk grabbed him by the shoulders since Light's thoughts were running in mad circles. "You didn't do anything wrong; I'm just letting you break a few rules."

"What do you mean?" There was still that quiver in his voice, and it made him sick to hear it.

"That's the power of the Death Note. It lets you kill."

-

-

* * *

A/N - Hopefully that wasn't too dry with all the game mechanics. I played way too many games in the past. Ryuk looks in-game the way he normally does in the manga, and Light, in-game, looks like he did in the anime when he was having an inner monologue, with the red hair and eyes.

Edit - Yes, reading the game rules is boring (and Mikami sucks at the job too), but hopefully only in the same way that reading the rules of the Death Note is boring. Some of them were necessary for plot development, teehee.

See you next chapter!


	3. The New World

The New World

* * *

Reiji Namikawa glanced over at the fairy lights dancing out of the corner of his eye. As if he didn't have enough to worry about already just being the Vice President of Sales, he was moonlighting, like everyone else at Wammy House, with the additional duty of monitoring other employees' online statuses. Several screens occupied the corner of his desk, and upon them the vital signs for the employees currently logged into the game at Wammy House Headquarters in Winchester, England blinked erratically. He didn't think it was that important a duty when there had been no adverse health effects thus far, but common sense dictated that someone monitor them since this was still a developing technology.

There had been an unusual flicker out of the corner of his eye so he scrolled through the screens just in case, looking at the names and checking things like blood pressure and heart rate, but there were no abnormalities. At this time of the morning, the only people that were on were the odd developer or technician and the few Moderator volunteers for this particular shift. He was glad he had been promoted from the Japanese branch to the Headquarters and wouldn't be asked to do something so trivial. Someone with his level of education shouldn't have to ask questions of the beta testers, who were largely unwashed, housebound recluses with barely enough social skills to fill a handbag. The irony that his job relied on these asocial masses was not lost on him, however.

Well, since nothing was wrong, he should get back to his reports on projected sales for the next quarter. Pre-orders alone would start to compensate for the enormous cost of building this game and they might finally start to see profits a few months after the game's launch.

As Reiji settled back into his early morning routine, the screen continued to show that the employees' vitals had not changed drastically. What he had failed to notice was that one name had dropped off completely.

* * *

Light logged off after the incident with Mikami. Even in a stupid video game, things like killing someone couldn't be taken so lightly. It had been so real, nothing like shooting monsters and sniping pixelated people on other gaming platforms. There was a real person behind Mikami's avatar, not an AI. He had seen the horror and shock on Mikami's face, watched the horribly convincing life fade from his eyes as the second smile under his chin opened up and vomited gore all over them both.

This was a _sick_ game. Rather, the Death Note gave it that potential.

It was too much to think about, so he hadn't even allowed Ryuk to explain and just woke up. His hands were clammy with sweat, and it ran in rivulets down his face as he set the visor aside. Even if he really wanted to throw it, that might damage it and he couldn't justify the waste. He touched the sweat and pulled his fingers away, making sure it wasn't the phantom blood that had felt so real for a few moments.

He shook off the nervousness with difficulty and got out of his bed with the intent to head downstairs. He needed to see and interact with real people for a little while.

His bedside clock showed that only an hour had passed since his login. His sense of time in the game was slightly skewed since it hadn't felt that long, but that was what the alarm was for, after all, to keep him from being logged in too long.

Light could take a few hours off and maybe log back in after dinner. He had to find Ryuk and ask about that killing power since the man had said he would be off the next two days as well. He was just a little too rattled to ask the right questions right now.

He just kept seeing Mikami's _face_.

* * *

The next time Light logged back into The World, Ryuk showed up while he was still in the map room.

"Hey, kid, I thought I'd scared you off earlier." Light tried to shrug, but the nonchalance was forced. Ryuk hung in the air like something out of nightmare, his normally white face blue from the glow of the map and no less sinister for the change.

"How'd you find me so quickly?"

"You pinged me earlier when you appeared in Ravenloft, and that gave me your character's 'address' of sorts. It's something in the Death Note that lets me find you." Light cast a baleful glare at him, but Ryuk continued before he could ask the inevitable questions about his identity. "Only I can trace it since I made the Death Note. It just lets me see when you log in and find you right away. I can't see any personal information, remember? You have more questions?" His grin was maniacal.

"Sure. For one, how am I here again? The narrator said I would only be here the first time." A few hours being around his family for dinner and watching television had returned him to relative normalcy. It was easier to remember that this was all just a game when he spent a few hours being bored by his real life.

It was real life versus his virtual life. Already his existence had split between the two. How pathetic.

"The game thinks you have a beta account for now. Since the beta testers are essentially beginning anew every time they log in, they appear at the start screen each time. You're not a beta, however; you're sort of an NPC."

"A Non-Playable Character? But how is that possible?" Ryuk's smile in answer was frightening with that oversized mouth of his.

"Because I designed the Death Note to leave a trail like that. The game thinks you're a beta right now, but when the game goes live, it won't know what you are and will just think that you're an AI. It's really technical and not very interesting. Essentially, you appear here at the map and pick wherever you want to go."

Light looked over the map for a few moments, his list of questions now scrambled after getting that kind of information.

"It thinks my character is being controlled by a program?"

"Yes, so it won't keep tabs on you. Do you know how much processing power it would take to create logs of every NPC in the game individually? If you do some truly off the wall things, it might set off an alarm on some techie's workstation, but then you can just log out and your trail is gone."

"Wow." Light didn't have any more to say than that. The game had sounded lame at first, but the prospect of doing something that wouldn't connect to him in any way sounded appealing.

That was where all these virtual reality games became trouble. In this day and age, every seemed to have online activities and screen names that were carefully guarded by their owners so people couldn't connect their online selves with their real life identities. Everyone was living a double life with their public personae in addition to their anonymous pennames. Light had avoided things like that mainly because the Internet was full of idiots. It made sense since the morons around him were the same people polluting the Internet, and he highly doubted their intellect increased by being anonymous. If anything, people probably let loose more online due to its anonymity.

"Any more questions? You must have more than that." Ryuk's comment woke him from his musings.

"Yes, but it's more personal preference. Can I make myself look any more different since I still look a lot like myself? You look nothing… well, almost nothing like you do in real life."

"Of course. You can make more modifications once the game goes live. A beta looking like me would get a Mod's attention faster, so I only allowed you the basic changes available to everyone. Once The World is full of people, I'll unlock the controls so you can make yourself look like a monster if you want to. You can also buy scarves or hoods to cover your face with. People like doing that sort of thing."

"Last thing for now, I think. This killing power the Death Note has… What am I doing when I kill someone?"

"You destroy their avatar." Light waited, but Ryuk offered no more information.

"Am I doing anything to the real person?"

"No, you can't affect a real person by doing things to them in-game. You can't even hurt their characters that badly. Pick a town and I'll show you." Light pressed a random location and opened his eyes to the empty hotel-like room from before. The transition was almost immediate into the actual game. The voice from before echoed faintly over his head, telling him the name of the town, but he ignored it. Ryuk popped into existence over his shoulder, floating above the tiled floor with his bony wings.

"Don't go outside yet; there's probably a Mod hanging around waiting for newcomers. Now go punch that wall." A hand bedecked with silver rings pointed at part of the building.

"What?" Light laughed, hearing his own voice bouncing around the otherwise-empty chamber. Ryuk chuckled, which sounded much more hideous coming from that body.

"Punch the wall. It won't hurt." Light moved closer to the wall and drew back a fist, contemplating the wisdom of doing this even if this was just an avatar's flesh and bones and not his own. It was pixels, a mere game, not real at all; it just looked real since he was seeing it from his eyes.

Decision made, he struck the wall with a moderate amount of force. His hand stung as if he'd slapped it instead. No permanent damage.

"Now hit it as hard as you can," Ryuk ordered imperiously.

Rolling his eyes and wondering when he'd started taking orders from a stranger in a monster's body, he punched it as hard as he could, which probably would have shattered his hand in real life. Now a small explosion of pain danced along his nerve endings as blood seeped from his split knuckles. However, the pain passed from one breath to the next even if the blood stayed for aesthetic purposes. It continued to tingle like limbs gone dead from lack of circulation, more a signal that his hand had been damaged than anything else.

He breathed in wonder; he couldn't help himself. The fact that a simple headset could give him this kind of sensation was astonishing. Wammy House was sitting on a gold mine.

"See?" Ryuk's voice brought him back to reality. "You can barely hurt yourself in-game. That's about as much pain as you'll ever feel. After all, who would want to play a game in which you could actually feel yourself getting disemboweled by monsters? That's sick!" Ryuk laughed, and Light belatedly joined in. "The most you did to Mikami was give him a little spike of pain before he got logged out. Don't worry about him. He's a pompous ass anyway."

"He sounded like it." Light flexed his tingling fingers, smiling a little. Ryuk had done much to ease his fears. After all, he didn't want to hurt anyone in real life by killing them in a stupid game, but if all Mikami had felt was the little flash of pain, that wasn't that bad…. Right?

It was just a game, after all.

* * *

Mail Jeevas strolled through the corridors of Wammy House Headquarters before reaching Reiji's open door. He banged on the doorframe unceremoniously, interrupting the older man's phone call. Reiji glared at him and motioned that he'd speak to him in a moment, gesturing at the earpiece in his ear.

No one used Mail's real name, instead calling him "Matt" which was his screen name. Few people at Wammy House used each other's real names, instead referring to each other by their aliases or screen names, except for the executives that didn't play the game and only stuck to the administrative side of things.

Matt ignored the unspoken request to wait outside and tossed a small pile of reports on Reiji's desk, chewing gum in a manner that was sure to annoy the prim executive. He couldn't smoke indoors away from his tiny office so he needed some sort of oral stimulation in place of cigarettes.

Sighing exasperatedly, Reiji terminated his call and shot an annoyed look at Matt. "What is it?"

"I brought the reports from the development team that you need for the meeting this morning."

"You could have emailed them to me. There's no need for you to come up here."

"Yeah, but I want to check out your monitor. Mikami's been out for almost two days and you never noted it, so I think there's something wrong with your feeds."

"Teru Mikami?" Reiji let Matt behind his desk to fiddle with the monitor he used to watch vital signs. "What do you mean he's been 'out' for two days?"

"He's still unconscious from his last Moderator shift. Mello found him yesterday like that, asleep in his office with his headset on, but he's not logged into the game. He won't wake up either." Mello had used some rather unorthodox methods in an attempt to wake him, which had been funny at first, but nothing had worked.

After that, Mikami been moved to the infirmary since dehydration was setting in. If he wasn't awake the next day, they were going to move him to the hospital and treat him as a coma patient, but the doctors working for Wammy House weren't willing to cause a media scandal already by exposing him to the public. The media would blow anything that concerned Wammy House out of proportion because their game generated such great ratings. Wammy House didn't need to feed the fire with fears that people were becoming trapped in the game.

"Ah, I thought so," Matt said, peering at the logs. "He dropped out of the system about 30 hours ago. It doesn't look he logged out, so his vitals just quit being monitored. That's weird. I wonder if there's something wrong with his link to the game."

"I'll tell the President at this morning's meeting. Is there anything else I should know?" Reiji was shuffling some papers behind him, but he didn't turn to look.

"Nothing other than the basic reports in that stack right there," Matt gestured at the pile on the desk as he inspected the computer's hardware. It would be alarming if it turned out that Mikami was actually in a coma due to some technical malfunction.

"I'd just let Mr. Wammy know about Mikami's condition before the meeting." Matt added. "No need to worry more people than necessary." He didn't have that much interest in visiting the President this morning, so he was willing to let Reiji do it instead.

* * *

Reiji waited long moments to tell Mr. Quillsh Wammy news that could potentially be damning to them as a business. If this turned out to be more than an isolated incident, governmental regulations would come from every direction and cripple them, possibly even prevent them from producing the game. Then Wammy House would go under, bankrupted by the millions they had already spent on development that would go nowhere when they had no hope of recouping the money.

Wammy had been a humble inventor as well as a founder of several orphanages in England. However, he had generated one of the biggest technological advances of the century and would revolutionize online gaming and interaction with this creation. Now this former tinker was the President of Wammy House Corporation, a company poised to be as successful as the best in the technological industry. However, he was a better parent than a king, and he insisted on being a part of almost every facet of development, which made him a very busy and very distracted man.

"What is it, Mr. Namikawa?" Wammy didn't look up from his desk after a brief glance at him. He was starting to show signs of stress at the growing frenzy over the nearness of the game's release.

"Just some reports that I wanted to give you in person. Apparently there's a health concern about one of the employees that we don't want the media to know about." Reiji waited, but Wammy didn't even nod in reply, his eyes flickering from one screen to another. The man had two monitors at his desk and papers spread across the entire surface, and it didn't even look like he was paying attention to him.

Well, it wouldn't be the first time that Reiji had just talked with his reflection in the window behind Wammy.

"One of our employees is in what might be a temporary coma. He's not responding to stimulus but his condition is stable. There have never been any problems severing a connection with the game before so it's a cause for concern."

No response. He was having a conversation with himself.

"Hmm, the media?" This was Wammy's contribution to the conversation.

"The man concerned is Teru Mikami, an otherwise healthy individual from Legal. He's in the infirmary now, and we're moving him to the hospital if nothing improves. We didn't want a media storm from this, which is why…" Reiji trailed off. It was more than slightly offensive that Wammy didn't even look up, merely humming every now and then whenever he paused for breath. He was frantically typing out an email while glancing unconvincingly in his direction every few seconds.

The man hadn't heard a word.

"Actually, Mikami and I were thinking of getting married, and we want L to be the godfather of our adoptive children," Reiji said dryly.

Wammy actually looked up at that, blinking behind his spectacles as Reiji kept a perfectly straight face. "What about my son?"

Reiji sighed, knowing the older man had heard nothing except the name of his pride and joy. At least now he was paying attention to him.

"Teru Mikami's unconscious, probably due to the game. I won't mention it in the meeting, so I'm telling you now." Wammy nodded.

"Sorry, Mr. Namikawa. I've been distracted lately. Let me know if anything changes regarding that development, please." Well, that was better than nothing. Reiji turned and left the room, wondering if half the things he told Wammy ever got through.

* * *

"_AAHH!"_ the scream bounced off the infirmary's walls and echoed down the corridor.

It startled Mihael Keehl out of the task of lovingly peeling the silver wrapper off a bar of Swiss chocolate. As to why he was eating in an infirmary, he had taken to hiding these bars amongst the seldom-used medical supplies in the storage room since he doubted that it would occur to anyone as a hiding place, especially L. The man avoided even the suggestion of disease, so his treats were safe from Wammy House's other resident sugar fiend.

Mello tried to juggle his ever-present chocolate bar without sacrificing it to the potentially dirty floor as it danced out of his grip. After it was safely back in his hands, he abandoned the stash of chocolate in favor of investigating the noise. His heart still racing from the unexpected sound as well as the fear of losing good imported chocolate, he peered around the doorway in the direction that the scream had come from, his inquisitive mind wondering what was going on.

Even though he expected it when he stepped into Teru Mikami's room, the sight still made him laugh under his breath in perverse amusement. The prim and haughty lawyer had tumbled out of his bed and was sprawled on the floor in a tangle of sheets, clutching at his throat with his eyes bugged out of his head. Fortunately, they hadn't redressed him in a hospital gown so he still had on his undershirt and pants rather than a blue or sea foam green mini-dress.

Mello stepped inside as the man continued to gasp and hold his neck, making retching noises like he was going to vomit all over the floor. He hurried to grasp the wastebasket by the door and set it beside him before backing off. He didn't want to stand close enough to get puked on if Mikami was going to lose it.

"You okay?" he asked as he pressed the button that would get the doctor on call to come to the room; Mikami was certainly incapable of doing so.

Mikami was sickly green, sweat trickling down his face. He'd ripped the IV out of his arm by falling, and there was a trickle of blood in his elbow. He kept pulling his hands away from his throat as he gasped, staring at them like he was going to find something.

It looked like Mello wasn't going to get an answer, so he sat in a chair by the door to keep an eye on him until the doctor got there, unwrapping the rest of his chocolate in the meantime. Mikami kept swallowing, finally leaning back against the bed and letting his hands fall to the side. At least he wasn't going to puke; it might make Mello lose his appetite.

"That game is… disgusting." Mikami eventually gasped, his eyes coming to rest on Mello.

"What do you mean?" Mello asked, nibbling at the edge of the chocolate. Mmm, he did love milky Swiss chocolate. He would have to get more of this.

"I just had my throat cut!" His raspy voice was almost shrill compared to his normal soft speech. "I thought couldn't happen, and it felt pretty _damn_ realistic!"

"That's not possible." Mello answered in a flippant deadpan. "Player characters can't get killed. We tested that." He and Matt had been forbidden to continue wrestling, pulling pranks, and making improvised weapons during work hours. Instead, they had spent plenty of time attempting to kill each other in game. When Ryuk had still been on the team, he had been creating a fighting arena that would have allowed players to take each other on in single or group combat.

However, Wammy had shut down his idea and directed them to make it impossible to kill or hurt another player character. It was not so much Ryuk's idea that Wammy objected to but rather Ryuk's best friend and Wammy's own foster son. The older man didn't want to indulge anyone's violent or malicious tendencies, even at the cost of taking important elements out of the game.

Therefore, the only things that could hurt or kill players were environmental disasters, dungeon traps, and monsters or other creatures. That was a pity since hurting each other had been loads of fun.

"So what happened?" Mello prodded Mikami, curious about what had really happened.

"I was talking to one of the testers." Mikami had to stop to swallow, his breathing still elevated. "I was explaining the fact that you can't kill other players, and… and he _cut my throat_! Then I woke up here." He suddenly looked around, seemingly surprised at his surroundings. "Where am I?"

"The infirmary. You've been out almost three days."

"Impossible." Mikami's voice sounded lost. "It just happened… Three days?" Mello had never seen the older lawyer look as confused as he did right now but he couldn't say as he disliked the sight.

Fortunately, the doctor appeared at that moment, so Mello zipped out now that he had some interesting news for Matt.

* * *

"I've got it!" Wammy's voice sounded unusually animated.

"What have you found?" L pinched the phone between two fingers and continued devouring his miniature mountain of melon balls soaked in honey glaze with a tiny dessert fork.

"I've finally settled on a name for this thing, this game that's consuming all our lives right now."

"And…?" L prompted, hearing the satisfied smile in the man's voice.

"I'm calling the game 'The New World.' Seems fitting since I want it to be a place for everyone to meet regardless of economic status or citizenship or background…" he trailed off, lost in thinking about it for the moment. The lapse in his attention was forgivable since L knew him well.

This game was to be Wammy's most significant accomplishment, the most visible legacy he would leave behind. He'd put more thought into this virtual world than anyone else so it was perfectly understandable that he would be overwhelmed by it finally coming to fruition.

L was relieved, frankly, that this was finally about to start. He had spent years being a sounding board for ideas along with his loose association of 'brothers', the other orphans that Wammy had welcomed to the original Wammy House orphanage. Wammy's drive to create and educate genius children had given him the most gifted creators, designers, and software techs in the world to work with now that they were older. Granted, Near was only 16 as the youngest of them, but things like age hardly applied to genii of their caliber. L himself had reminded them that this was paying back Wammy for his generosity years ago even if the older man had never asked for it. None of them had ever objected to the task after that.

"So, Watari," L continued. 'Watari' was the first alias that Wammy had worked under online, and it was the name he gave to people when he didn't want the notoriety of being the head of Wammy House to come into play. "I take it you've already informed Marketing so they can start the campaign?"

"I'll tell them soon enough. I wanted you to be the first. Thanks for all your hard work, son."

"Always a pleasure. I'm looking forward to fulfilling my job when the game goes live."

"I trust the Watchers will have plenty of work. People are always willing to make mischief."

_I'm counting on that_, L thought as he snapped his phone shut.

-

-

* * *

A/N – Sorry for the incredible delay. I really hated my first draft of this chapter, and I've been highly distracted lately. Maybe I did shoot myself in the foot by having so many stories!


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